Google to open new Irish data centre

Google has announced that it will open a new data centre in Grange Castle, west Dublin, that will employ 30 technical staff.

The construction phase will provide around 200 jobs, as an existing site is redeveloped for the purpose.

Google said that the siting of the data centre was influenced in part by the Irish climate which allows significant savings in cooling due to new technologies being able to exploit ambient temperature air for a large proportion of the year.

The development represents an investment by Google of around €75 million.

Minister for enterprise trade and employment, Richard Bruton TD, was at the announcement and welcomed the job creation and further investment by Google in Ireland.

"As I have said repeatedly, the global cloud computing industry offers Ireland a massive opportunity for jobs and economic growth. I am determined that government will act decisively to seize that opportunity, and that is why I have established a cross-government implementation group to ensure that prompt action occurs," said Minister Bruton.

"The decision by Google, one of the most important multinational companies in Ireland, to locate a state of the art data centre in Dublin is an endorsement of our policies in this area, and a sign of what is possible if we continue ourfocus".

"We’re very happy to continue investing in Ireland and to build out our presence here even further," said John Herlihy, head of Google Ireland. "The new data centre will be one of the most energy-efficient in Google’s global fleet. This investment further strengthens our presence here, and I’d like to thank IDA Ireland for the assistance they gave us in selecting this site."

Google employs more than 2,000 people in Ireland across multiple sites.